Description
General: ill-smelling annual, branched from the base, the
principal branches 10-60 cm long, creeping at least below.
Herbage sparsely or moderately short-hairy, or eventually
almost hairless.Leaves: alternate, rather short-stalked, ovate to broadly
elliptic in outline, the blade mostly 2-5 cm long and 1-3 cm
wide, evidently pinnately lobed about halfway to the axis
into about 7 to 10 narrowly triangular, blunt lobes, with
wider recesses between.Flowers: few in separate clusters, the main stalks stout,
ascending. Individual flower stalks clustered almost umbel-
like and becoming bent down at least in fruit. Calyx short,
the 5 rather narrow lobes often unequal, up to about 6 mm
long at maturity, frequently bent back at least at the tip.
Corolla white, 5-9 mm wide when expanded, the 5 narrowly
triangular lobes often bent back.
Flowering time: July-August.Fruits: berries, round, greenish, 9-14 mm thick, nodding,
containing many seeds.

DistributionA weed in fields, along roadsides, disturbed sites, also
sometimes found in undisturbed places at moderate and
low elevations, in c., e. and some s.w. parts of MT. Native
in the drier areas from the Great Plains to the Cascades.

Edible Uses:
The ripe fruit of cut-leaved nightshade is edible raw or cooked. It was used in times of food shortage
by the Acoma, Western Keres, Laguna, and Zuni Indians. The ripe fruit was boiled, ground, mixed with ground
chile and salt and was eaten as a condiment with mush or bread. Eaten as a fruit or vegetable, the fruit
can also be dried, ground into a powder and used with cereals for making bread etc.

Caution:
The unripe fruits are reported to be mildly poisonous, but are seldom eaten. The leaves are poisonous
too, as they are in most species of this genus.

Medicinal Uses:
A decoction of the berries was used by the Blackfoot Indians in the treatment of stomach aches and for
children with diarrhea.